The piece is impressive, strong in its brevity and aphoristic tension. Lush strings – the Britten Sinfonia sound is very opulent – and ricocheting oboe phrases encapsulate the “bitter sweetness” of desire. The “fire that races benath the skin” cues a twitchy, obsessive blues. The cantata ends with a famous meditation on the setting moon and Pleiades. The strings unfold a sequence of shivery Bergian chords, and voice and oboe briefly entwine before the singer is left in solitude. Throughout, Chance’s voice hovers in a world beyond gender, perhaps acknowledging that we at long last accept a universality of emotion in Sappho that transcends orientation.